The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-07-02

have ever been consecrated to the COM
pany of the gods. Those who merely
consume the results of others labors
are tramps or worse. At any rate they
neither pay for their board nor lodging.
These are Of two classes. 1 don't
know which is the saddest to see, the
house breaker in Jail or the voluptuary
in his gorgeous coach. I ought to
make an exception in passing in favor
of the very old and the very young.
The old are useful though they cannot
create; the young are useful for other
reasons. With these exceptions MAIN
tain my assertion that men are to be
estimated by the amount of good they
have done in the world.
1 am prepared to defend the PROPOSE
tion that the brain is the great work.
shop Of humanity. Yonder College will
in time contribute more of wealth to
this city than all your tall chimneys.
1t would be too much to expect that
there are no fools in Akron; that there
are no people who say that colleges are
of no use that editors, preachers, etc.,
are not practical, and must be supported
at the expense of farmers and mechan-
les. History is full of examples of the
practical power of thinking. Every
priest in the Cathedral of Pisa for years
had seen the lamps suspended with
long and short wires swung to and fro;
but Calico went there and during dry
sermon discovered regularity in their
motions and announced the law on
which depends the accuracy of the as
Economical clock, whereof he alone had
the dial in his brain. Every farmer in
Cambridgeshire saw apples fall day after
day, but only one man discovered the
law of gravitation. Out of Mrs. Min
heal's tea-kettle James Watt, drone,
breeds a giant which is to-day doing
the work of 100000 of slaves. How
hard they used to tug at catapults and
bow-strings to protect their towns and
walled cities, but Schwartz makes gun
powder and catapults go out Of fash
ion. Whoever harnesses the elephant
has no need of muscle. So we see that
a high place must be given to the intel
lectual productions of man. 1t is only
400 years ago this very month since the
cracked Drained Genoan navigator was
trying to persuade Ferdinand of Spain
TO waists money on new route to IN
dia. At that time the ''world" was
only a part of Asia, northern Africa
and a little of Europe beneath the
ground was hell, and above the stars
was heaven. The whole world to them
was no larger than the moon, and yet
the moon is only burned out she'll
hung up for show.
Two hundred years ago Newton de-
monstrated the law of gravitation, and
to those who received it the world ex-
panded and became more wonderful.
Herbert Spencer's law of evolution COM
pletes in the grasp of things what all
the great intellectual minds of the
world have been feeling after for years.
1t is the grandest conception that ever
entered human brain, and yet men
who never studied it shy at it. The tele-
scope has expanded the universe. The
sun is known to be so far away that if
child with an arm long enough to
reach to the sun should burn its hand
in its infancy, it would die of old age
before it would feel the pain. There
are beings as much smaller than man
as he is smaller than the whole uni
verse. Who is not glad to live where he
can learn such things in College cur
riculump We say that we have annihi-
lated space and yet we have created far
more than we have abolished. 1 can
remember when it was said that rail-
roads could not be built only on a level
grade, and yet they have crept along
until men have strung cities on them
like pearls, climbed mountains and
bridged rivers.
1t is doubtful if the last 5000 years
show any increase in the intellectual
capacity of man; but the progress that
has been made in the scope and reach
OF mans undertakings are we'll nigh
immeasurable. Man may outstrip all
the accomplishments of the past; but
there is always ''but" in every SER
mon), there can be no inventive machine
for the manufacture Of character. There
is only one way to be great and good,
and that is the old way. A power
welded for good can also be welded for
evil. 1t takes more Of a man to sit on
a moving machine than to NOW with a
scythe. Inventions are good if they can
be managed. To cross the ocean in
dory is safer and quicker than in a
steamer, if you don't know how to
manage the steam. 1t seems that char
acter in this country is advancing at a
snails pace while invention is going at
lightning speed.
Moses has been dead 5000 years We
his commandments form the basis of
our moral law in all nations. The moral
SAnSp of mankind doao NOT daoov